Sunday, October 01, 2006

There can be endless arguments over which beer is best. But the owner of a Bavarian-style bar in Glasgow, Scotland is running afoul of the law over the proper glassware in which he must serve his beverages.

As reported by German radio network Deutsche Welle, this pub owner sells his beer--which meets stringent German beer purity standards--in traditional half-liter and liter sized German steins and glasses. But in Britain it's actually a criminal offense to serve draft beer in those quantities. Although Britain is part of the European Union and must use the metric system for almost all measures, the UK has managed to get an exception from the EU to use the pint measure for beer, milk, and cider, because of the pint's longstanding, integral in the British Isles.

I'm not sure which is sillier--England's law that beer must be sold in pint measures, or the EU's rule that demands that make it illegal to sell most goods in traditional British Imperial measures such as pounds, pints, and feet. In 2001, an English grocer was actually prosecuted for selling a pound of bananas, instead of whatever was the equivalent number of grams.

I'm glad to know that in the U.S. I can order a cold one in a pint, glass, or even a dirty Mason jar if I want. I'm heading to the fridge right now for a frosty brew... all this talk about laws and measurements is making me thirsty.